1. Field of the Invention
The present inventions relates to agricultural implements for harvesting cotton in general, and more particularly to a cotton gin for associated use in a pneumatic machine for harvesting cotton.
2. Description of the Related Art
Efforts have been made for many years to build cotton harvesting machines which can harvest cotton fiber (cotton balls) from cotton plants as efficiently and cleanly as manual labor but at a higher speed and lower cost. It is known in the prior art to utilize vacuum air suction for harvesting cotton balls. However, the known cotton picking machine using vacuum air suction, are not selective and as such they collect anything from the cotton plants that is sufficiently loose, such as sticks, leaves, dirt particles, etc. As a result, the cotton harvested by the conventional cotton picking machine using vacuum air suction, is dirty (dirt is mixed with the cotton fiber) and of lower quality than cotton picked by hand. The dirt is not removed during the ginning process and the compressed bale is sold to customers in as is condition. Moreover, the conventional cotton picking machines drop approximately 10 to 20% of the cotton fiber to the ground during the picking process.
It is well known in the art that the cotton gin is a machine that quickly and easily separates the cotton fibers from the seeds and thorns. These seeds are either used again to grow more cotton or, if badly damaged, are disposed of. Usually, the cotton gin uses a combination of a wire screen and small wire hooks to pull the cotton through the screen, while brushes continuously remove the loose cotton lint to prevent jams.
In a harvester, the harvested cotton fiber is carried by continuous flows of air through an outlet duct rearwardly to a storage trailer pulled behind the cotton harvesting machine. Preferably, the storage trailer has a movable partition that allows the machine operator to selectively compress the picked cotton to increase storage capacity of the trailer. The trailer is detachable from the cotton harvesting machine. The full trailer is towed to the cotton gin and emptied to continue the picking process.
Therefore, the cotton picking machines are susceptible to improvements that may enhance their performance and cost. With this in mind, a need exists to develop a cotton gin with improved performance, inexpensive, and providing for more cost effective, efficient and low cost maintenance, which is incorporated into a pneumatic cotton picking (harvesting) machine.